The present invention relates to performance apparatus which receive user's operation of a plurality of key switches and execute a performance in response to the user's operation of the key switches, as well as tone generation methods using the performance apparatus.
Application program called “TENORI-ON” has been known, for example, from
Non-patent Literature 1: “Keitai News” [online], Jan. 16, 2002, ADSCII, [searched on Apr. 1, 2004], the Internet website http://k-tai.ascii24.com./k-tai/news/2002/01/16/632762-000.html?geta, and
Non-patent Literature 2: “World of Digista Curator” [online], Digital Stadium, Toshio Iwai, Exhibit=TENORI-ON, [searched on Apr. 1, 2004], the Internet website http://www.nhk.or.jp/digista/lab/digista_ten/curator.html.
In performance apparatus, such as those for portable phones and game apparatus, point-designating inputs entered by a user are received via 16×16 grids that are arranged in a matrix configuration with the horizontal axis representing the timing and the vertical axis representing the tone pitch. These performance apparatus sequentially generate tone pitches corresponding to user-designated points from a leftmost vertical row (or column) onward. In this way, the users can use the performance apparatus to compose and perform simple music pieces with enhanced elaborateness and originality.
In the aforementioned conventional performance apparatus, tone generating data is preset per designatable point, and a music piece is formed by tones being generated repetitively at the individual designated points on the basis of the presettings. Thus, the same music piece is merely repeated at predetermined intervals, so that, with the conventional performance apparatus, the degree of freedom in composing a music piece would be considerably limited. Further, in the conventional performance apparatus, a same pattern of light-emitting display (i.e., illumination) is also repeated at predetermined intervals; thus, the degree of freedom regarding the light-emitting display (i.e., illumination) pattern would also be considerably limited. The user may easily get bored of such repetition of the same music piece and light-emitting display pattern.